A mixture of bungled executions, strange last requests and classic final one-liners from medieval times to the present day. Sometimes it’s hard to be an executioner, trying to keep someone from popping up to make a quip when they should have spectacularly sunk without trace. Or to be told that the condemned to the guillotine won’t have a last drink for fear of ‘completely losing his head’. The business of death can be seriously absurd, and nothing illustrates this better than these tales of the gruesome and frankly ridiculous ways in which a number of ill-fated unfortunates met (or failed to meet) their maker. Geoffrey Abbott served for many years as a Yeoman Warder at the Tower of London. He now lives in the Lake District where he acts as a consultant on execution and torture to film and TV companies.